Board meeting Minutes/20 March 2006

Prior: 13 March 2006

Board meeting Minutes

Next: 27 March 2006

Minutes approved: 27 March 2006

Present

Tom Perrine (chair), Matthew Barr, Trey Harris, Doug Hughes, Andrew Hume, Chris Palmer, David Parter, Stephen Potter, Pat Wilson (note taker), Sam Albrecht

Opened

20:07 Eastern Time

Closed

21:52 Eastern Time

Consent Agenda

• Approve minutes of 13 March 2006

Moved to 27 March meeting

Action Items

Board Committees

• Development Committee (Wilson/Potter)
  • Wilson - Work on proposals for potential sponsors - no action

• Partnership and Liason Committee (Perrine)

• Leadership Committee (Greg Rose)

• Policy Committee (Harris)

• Communications Committee

• Membership Committee

Program Committees

• Conference Planning Committee (Wilson/Perrine)
  • Parter - Write a note to the intl members asking whether they'd like to be ambassadors for LOPSA to SANE - no action
  • Perrine - Send a Parter-written note to the intl members asking whether they'd like to be ambassadors for LOPSA to SANE - not done

• Technical (Online) Services (Hughes/Parter)
  • Parter - Monthly transaction/product sales reports - in progress / stalled
  • Parter - Mailing lists/online forum - in progress - need visual review/work from theme team
  • Parter - Sponsorships page from database - stalled
  • Hughes - Sponsorships in "userdb" interface - in progress

The new website theme is up.

• Content Services Committee (Palmer/Potter)

Palmer is working on guidelines for web- topic-area editors. 1st draft of the "About Us" document is done and online.

Non-Committee

• Financial
  • Hume - Present draft financial policies for Board approval.
    • Hume to bundle raw process notes to Harris for policy. - not done
  • Hume - Work with Albrecht to revise financial statement for Board approval - Done. See below

• Albrecht:
  • Investigate and report on membership kit problems (especially pins/bubblewrap)
    • We have replaced 16 membership kits. This includes anyone that notified staff, any board member, or that Hans noted discussing on IRC. All were kits with pins in the original plastic bags - instead of the bubblewrapped pins. AH will provide a credit of 8 hours to LOPSA for this error, as instructions were clearly given to the staff on this.
  • Update on members without addresses. The correct number is 10.
  • Set up a list of NDAs on file on the wiki. - Done
  • Sent conference update to Matt, Pat, Tom on 3/20 (late).
  • talk with European partner org to see about printing and shipping flyers for SANE to save x-Atlantic costs. - not practical. will send to Damon for his transport.

• Barr:

• Harris:
  • Produce a proposal for membership drives - in progress - see below
  • Post a description of the Resume Standards project - not done

• Hughes:

• Hume:
  • Work with Usenix to pursuade them to sign a grant letter to the IRS by 30 March 2006 - in progress waiting on Usenix Board discussion

• Palmer:
  • Write a letter to non-paid lopsa.org account holders encouraging them to join (with Harris).

• Parter:
  • Revise the About Us page and begin the corporate history (with Palmer) - in progress The draft pages on lopsa-01 are currently hidden due to other dev testing

• Perrine:
  • Explore partnership possibilities with Company J - no action Looks unlikely at this time

• Potter:

• Wilson:
  • Produce a proposal for a volunteer recognition program (with Harris, Parter) - in progress see strawman on wiki

• unassigned
  • Contact NL member to see if he would like to be ambassador for SANE if attending

Standing Reports

• Treasurer's report (first meeting of the month only)
• Membership report
  • see Membership development on wiki
• Online report

Discounts

Hughes reports that he's discussed the possibility of member discounts with two LOPSA Corporate sponsors. One is definitely on board, and another likely. BitPusher is already discounting services for LOPSA members. It was agreed that more member discounts should be sought from likely organizations, some guidlines/policy set regarding discounts, and a web page should be created to publicize the member discounts.

ACTION ITEM: Barr and Harris to work on third-party discounts for members policy

ACTION ITEM: Potter to investigate company S and company O

Financial Reports

MOTION: by Hume, seconded by Hughes to accept the 2005 financial year 2005 report. Passes

Membership Drive Brainstorming

• There are a fair number of people who have web site accounts but who have not converted to "paid member" status. It's time to remind these folks that they're not yet LOPSA members.

ACTION ITEM: Parter, Hughes to make nice 403 error page for non-members who attempt to access member-only parts of the website

ACTION ITEM: Parter, Hughes will gather data for non-converters

ACTION ITEM: Harris will write and send letter

• "Charter" membership ends soon. There are two consequences: people who value the benefits of Charter membership need to join now and it's the last chance to come aboard at the $40 rate.

• Discussion ensued regarding possible approaches for membership drives. Two definite modes appeared: "sprint" and "ongoing". Both will be investigated.

[ Albrecht leaves at 21:31 ET ]

ACTION ITEM: Harris to produce a proposal for "sprint" mode.

ACTION ITEM: Parter to look into "ongoing" mode issues.

Business Plan update

Albrecht has commented on the current draft; Perrine now has 2005 financials and will address Albrecht's comments by end of week.

ACTION ITEMS: Perrine to incorporate startup costs in business plan

ACTION ITEMS: Perrine to address Albrecht comments

ACTION ITEMS: Perrine to re-post biz plan and send mail to Board

ACTION ITEM: All to re-read biz plan

Notes/announcements

• Harris reports Seattle local group is now "Seattle Area System Administrators Guild"

Adjournment

MOTION to Adjourn by Hume, seconded by Potter. Passes Adjourned at 21:52 ET